Cheney

Former State Department official Liz Cheney says that "It has certainly been a terrible 48 hours. In Libya, violent extremists killed American diplomats. In Cairo, mobs breached the walls of the U.S. Embassy, ripped down the American flag and replaced it with the al Qaeda flag."

In response to the attack in Cairo, diplomats there condemned not the attackers but those who "hurt the religious feelings of Muslims." The president appeared in the Rose Garden less than 24 hours later to condemn the Libya assault and failed even to mention the attack in Egypt. The message sent to radicals throughout the region: If you assault an American embassy but don't kill anyone, the U.S. president won't complain.

Though the administration's performance in the crisis was appalling, it wasn't surprising—it is the logical outcome of three-and-a-half years of Obama foreign policy.

In too many parts of the world, America is no longer viewed as a reliable ally or an enemy to be feared. Don't take my word for it. Ask Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Even as his country faces an existential threat from Iran, he can't get a meeting with President Obama. Ask the Poles and Czechs, two allies we abandoned when we canceled missile-defense systems that the president feared would offend the Russians. Ask the Iranian people who took to the streets to fight for their freedom, only to find Mr. Obama standing silently with the mullahs.

And concludes:

Apologizing for America, appeasing our enemies, abandoning our allies and slashing our military are the hallmarks of Mr. Obama's foreign policy. The Obama economy, with its high unemployment, massive debt and out-of-control spending, has rightly demanded our attention. As we head to the polls in November, we cannot ignore what is an even more dismal national-security record. An America already weakened by four years of an Obama presidency will be unrecognizable after eight.

What he says, and doesn’t say, is revealing.

On page 251, Dick Cheney admits a mistake. He had shot his friend Harry Whittington in the face, and in the hours that followed, did not put out a statement about the accident. “In retrospect,” he writes, “we should have.”

From the Scrapbook

Oct 25, 2010, Vol. 16, No. 06 • By

One of the stranger stories of recent times is the accidental shooting, on a hunting expedition in 2006, of Texas lawyer Harry Whittington by Vice President Dick Cheney. As everyone must know, Cheney aimed and fired his shotgun at quail on the wing and stray buckshot sprayed Whittington, who was standing nearby, in his face and chest. His injuries were serious, but not life-threatening, and Whittington recovered.